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https://www.tokeofthetown.com/2010/03..._plants_wh.php

Medical Pot Patient Robbed, Beaten; Cops Take Plants While He's Dying
45 comments
By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ in Growing, Medical, News
Monday, March 15, 2010, at 11:31 am

Michael Shane Howard was attacked and killed by robbers who wanted his medical marijuana. While he lay dying, the cops took his plants.
​A Washington medical marijuana patient has died after being attacked by robbers who were after his pot crop. When local police were called to the scene, rather than investigating the assault, they started questioning mortally injured Michael Shane Howard about how many plants he had.



The police told Howard, who had just been clubbed in the head with a crowbar, that the medics would "probably just put a big bandage in his forehead and leave him at the house."

Two days after the attack, as Howard lay dying, the police called Howard's good friend and roommate, Renee Resser, and asked when she was going to go visit him in the hospital.

Then while Renee visited Howard at the hospital, she got a call from a friend telling her officers from the Pierce County, Washington Sheriff's Department were raiding her home.

When Renee rushed home, she was handcuffed and put in the back of a police car for 2-1/2 hours; officers told her it was because she lived in the same residence as Howard, even though his grow operation was outside in a shed.

"They took all his plants and equipment," Renee said. "It's so sickening that they are more worried about his meds than finding out who attacked him. His skull was bashed by a crowbar; it seems like they are not even trying to find out who did it. It makes me sick to my stomach!"

Mike_by_HappilyDayzed.jpeg
Photo: Skunk Magazine
Mike Howard's killers are still free. But the cops seemed a lot more interested in taking his plants than in finding his murderers.
​ The investigating officers didn't even take the murder weapon into evidence until the morning after the attack, when they finally realized Mike was likely not going to make it.

When Howard had been taken to the hospital, it was revealed that his skull was cracked and his brain was bleeding. He lay in a coma for two days before dying.

According to patient advocacy organization Cannabis Defense Coalition (CDC), Howard had been facing a constant and continued police harassment in the small town of Orting, Washington.

The local police, and Pierce County Sheriffs, would constantly pull Mike over because they knew him as the "medical marijuana activist" in town.

Ironically, local medical marijuana patient advocate Steve Sarich of CannaCare, who had spoken out forcefully in his attempt to get the word out about Howard's mistreatment at the hands of police, was himself shot in a home invasion and attempted medical marijuana robbery early Monday morning.

SteveSarich.jpg
Photo: Steve Sarich
Steve Sarich, CannaCare: "This has gotten totally out of hand. Apparently it's OK to kill someone in Pierce County -- as long as they're a medical marijuana patient."
​ "This has totally gotten out of hand," Sarich said three days before his own home was invaded. "Home invasions have been increasing and these crooks are getting more violent. I've had a home invasion and I can tell you that you won't sleep well after that."

"Pierce County law enforcement officers are out of control," Sarich said. "Apparently it's OK to try to kill someone in Pierce County -- as long as they're a medical marijuana patient."

"But then to raid Mike's garden while he's in the intensive care unit is just totally inexcusable," Sarich said.

Two or more would-be medical marijuana robbers broke into Sarich's Kirkland, Washington home just before 5 a.m. Monday and exchanged gunfire with Sarich. Sarich was injured but is expected to be fine; the home invader was taken to Harborview Medical Center.

King County sheriff's spokesman John Urquhart said medical marijuana was being grown in the house and was likely the motive for the robbery. "We are aware of the house," Urquhart said, reports Susan Gilmore of The Seattle Times.

A second suspect was found hitchhiking, said Urquhart, and was being questioned by authorities, while police were searching for two other supects.

"It seems that robbery has slowly replaced police raids as the number one patient fear in Washington State," said Ben Livingston, CDC spokesman.

"Violent thieves consider medical marijuana patients to be sitting targets, rarely able to readily defend themselves," Livingston said. "When patients do call police during or after a robbery, most often the police show up, take a report, and raid the patient."

"So, most medical marijuana patients have learned that calling the police for protection is a sure-fire way to have one's home raided," Livingston said. "What a fucked up Catch 22."

Two shot in Kirkland home invasion

[ddrew]

This makes me absolutely sick to read.

The pigs are paid pieces of shit with legs.

wtf!!! are the headlines larger for weed than murder?
anyone that lives there should move! you are not being served or protected!

[HighDesertJoe]

I quit growing on my property 25 years ago it wasn't the cops I was worried about it was the two guys with shot guns shooting the front door down that got me out of the grow game, Hell back then the cops came to the house and didn't even question the greenhouse full of weed they took off after the the rippers.
So 25 years later I'm going to do a little outdoor grow again and it's not the cops I'll be worried about but the low life scum of the earth rippers that will have me worried.
My heart felt prays go out to the victims and there family's in Washington state.
Karma's a BITCH

[ddrew]

Pit bulls and pistols
They might still get my weed, but most likely they will get shot/chewed full of holes for trying.

I don't rely on the pigs for protection.

[Stoner4Life]

unless these growers are telling thugs about their gardens I smell a foul conspiracy between the cops (who have access to many dirtbags) and these scumbag rippers who've committed the crimes. the cops have constantly harassed legal growers so it isn't much of a stretch to think that they'd enlist the aid of some scumbags by supplying the addys of local medical grows.


EDIT:
It would also explain why the pigs neglected to collect evidence in the beating crime which of course became a murder.

[Leroy Brown]

That connection jumped out at me as well.

yeah seems like hte cops might be behind all this just to discredit the MMJ scene fookin pigs,,,peace

one thing I noticed is... the activist guy steve... says.... its okay to TRY to kill someone as long as hes a med. mj user

its not okay to TRY to kill..

its okay TO kill period..


also me too I wonder how people could find out about their grows... maybe police like you said

police have access to information about who is a med user ^ really ^ -question marks-

[Space Case]

Originally Posted by Stoner4Life

unless these growers are telling thugs about their gardens I smell a foul conspiracy between the cops (who have access to many dirtbags) and these scumbag rippers who've committed the crimes. the cops have constantly harassed legal growers so it isn't much of a stretch to think that they'd enlist the aid of some scumbags by supplying the addys of local medical grows.


EDIT:
It would also explain why the pigs neglected to collect evidence in the beating crime which of course became a murder.

I noticed that as well. Cops are just basically thugs in uniforms, they are known to cover up murders, sell coke, buddy up with scumbag informants. So them "leaking" patient info and encouraging rippers that are probably meth head informants to begin with, is not a large stretch of the imagination at all!